WALTERS: Time to eliminate tax board and its power

The State Board of Equalization divided along party lines
Tuesday on how ---- and whether ---- to begin implementing the
state's new law aimed at collecting sales taxes from Internet
sellers.

The board's three Democrats voted to continue the implementation
process, even though Internet giant Amazon is sponsoring a
referendum to overturn the new law, passed just last month. The two
Republicans, who opposed the law, argued that with the referendum
pending, implementation is premature.

It's not only an unsettled political issue, but a legal one
since the Internet tax bill is, as the board's attorney, Randy
Ferris, said, "a new creature."

It's also another bit of evidence that the Board of
Equalization, created 132 years ago to ensure that counties applied
property taxes fairly, should be abolished.

It's simply ludicrous that the administration of taxes is
dependent on the ideological whims and personal agendas of five
politicians. The board's purview now includes sales taxes and
income tax appeals from the Franchise Tax Board.

Four of the Board of Equalization members are elected from
immense districts, while the state controller has the fifth seat.
The controller, the chairman of the Board of Equalization and the
state finance director also constitute the Franchise Tax Board,
which collects personal and corporate income taxes.

It's a virtual invitation to decide tax policy, and even
individual tax cases, on the basis of ideology or political pull,
examples of which have popped up frequently.

We should create a Department of Revenue that would include the
functions of both boards, plus other tax-collecting agencies, with
an administrative appeals process, backed by a tax court and the
regular court system.

That structure has been proposed from time to time, but always
has been shot down by politicians who coveted cushy seats on the
Board of Equalization for themselves or their pals.

And that brings us to a redrawing of BOE districts by the
state's independent redistricting commission.

Its members wound up weeks of map-drawing late Sunday night by
jettisoning a widely criticized plan that would have radically
changed the shape of the four BOE districts (one would have run
from Oregon to Mexico).

It returned, instead, to a revision of the current map, with one
Los Angeles district, another encompassing the southernmost tier of
counties, a third along the coast, and a fourth covering most of
inland California.

The most likely outcome would be a continuation of the current
partisan split -- two Democrats, two Republicans and the
controller, usually a Democrat.

And that would continue BOE business as usual ---- vast power
over tax policy wielded by those with political agendas of one kind
or another.